I like to think that in the olden days, when our species saw volcanoes erupting, or heard wild animal sounds, or felt earthquakes, or any other kind of impending doom, that a certain kind of dread would fall before us.
Dread, is a fascinating thing. If I were to describe it, I would call it an inevitable future force that bears a message of impending doom.
What makes dread so cruel, is the fact that its power lies not only in the future, but also in the victim's own belief in their powerlessness to stop it.
Like a constant remeinder of one's doom and perhaps more importantly, of one's own weakness.
Anyway....
The morning right after, Max arose quite late, as usual, but in reality only a little later than he would ordinarily have woken up.
There was only one thing in his mind. Telling his friends about what his mother had said.
He stretched energetically in his bed before heading to his phone to send a text.
The text?
It would go to the group chat.
As with most things in the team, Ken kept an artificial link between their phones. That way, they could have conversations without any outside "interference."
Max: Yo! Guys! My mom just said you should come over for training later today in her lab.
To properly understand just how off brand this comment would sound to Tiffany, Luke and Ken, one would have to understand just what they thought of his mother.
In their eyes, his mother was not a bad person. No, in fact, they wouldn't expect a mother to react any differently than she did.
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That would have bothered them more, perhaps.
But what was truly terrifying, was the fact that it wasn't Max that said that. It was his mother.
The memory of an angry blue eyed woman that looked like she wanted them dead was firmly etched into their memories alongside feelings of guilt. There was no forgetting that night.
And to top it all off like some fancy cake, she was a completely different person the next morning. That only made them more suspicious.
And as if that wasnt enough, again, she was the one who'd called them.
Walking into that house would have been the equivalent of a fly going straight into a spider web.
Would they be killed? Likely no. However, what would happen? They had no idea. But they all instinctively knew this.... Max's mother had an ulterior motive.
Rose, however...
Rose: Oh my gosh! Really?
Max: Yeah. You guys coming?
Rose: Yeah, but wait! We have to ask Tiff first.
Of course, adding complications to this siuation, was the fact that Max and Rose were completely oblivious to their situation.
Max, because he didn't know what had happened, and Rose, because she was quick to believe what people said to her.
Max: Oh yeah.... Huh..... I guess we have to wait for her to reply then.
Rose: Yeah, but its ok. Tiff always replies to texts in the team group chat as quickly as she can.
And she was right, Tiffany had indeed already seen the chat. And shortly after, Ken and Luke would as well.
It was a complex situation.
Tiffany Chang was a girl of principle, and even before that, she couldn't say that Max's mother had done what she did.
To even insinuate that to her own son went against all sorts of social principles as well as her own code of honour.
And so the big question was simple. How on earth was she supposed to deal with this situation?
Both roads seemed utterly unacceptable.
Ken, who had also seen this text, had a similar line of thought.
Luke as well, who saw it last almost immediately recongnized the conundrum.
As for Max and Rose...
Rose: So, how's your mom doing?
Max: She's fine. Thanks again for all that food you helped mom cook, by the way. It tasted great.
Rose: Thanks. It wasn't a big deal, really.
She blushed and smiled nervously. Getting gratitude from Max just felt that good.
As for the others, Ken did something quite discrete.
He opened up another channel for himself, Luke and Tiffany to have a conversation about that.
After all, he knew his team leader well. Well enough to know that even she would be confounded by this.